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The River Ridge High School Administraion

Dr. Toni Zetzsche - Principal

Assistant Principals: Danielle Zammetti, Ron Bruno, Jessica Meek & Janene Sullivan

Our Mighty Ladies of the Front Office

Christine Panobianco, Maria Cardenas, Theresa Townsend, Kathy Jones &

Ellie Papapanos

Fine Arts Department

Qasem Abdel-Hadi, Christopher Greco, Theodore M. Locascio, Regina Palazzolo-Vera

VERY SPECIAL THANKS!

 Lynn Rae Vairo & Regina Palazzolo for providing needed dance rehearsal space, Christopher Greco, Tami Carr, Daniel Hall, Heather Smith, Brooke Casbar,

Mike Carlson for his photograhic brilliance, Taylor & Ann LaRoue, Rachel Knowles,

Music Matters, Janell Poulette, Tom Werner & Pro-Copy

Richard D'onofrio, Faith Brooks, Brett Branning (Technical Director),

Bryan Lankston (Lighting Designer), Eric Neubauer, Topher Warren, Garrett Case, Blane Williams, Taylor D'Onofrio, Ben Takitch (Set Construction, Scenic Artists, & Lighting) of The Center of the Arts at River Ridge

The deepest of gratitude to the parents and guardians of the extremely talented students involved on-stage and behind the scenes!

The videotaping or other video or audio recording of this production is strictly prohibited.

DIRECTOR'S NOTES

I believe I’ll always remember when and why I got the inspiration to want to produce The SpongeBob Musical. I was at my daughter’s house babysitting my grandson, Landon. When the recording of the stage show was coming on the TV, he got very excited. I wasn’t sure what to think as it was going on, but I looked over to Landon and he was in it!  He was dancing and singing along with each song and then planted himself to take in the scenes. To see my grandson so engaged in a video of the stage production was so endearing to watch and thus my choice for this year’s musical was set.

When I was at J.W. Mitchell High School, I collaborated with a great musical theatre artist by the name of William Garon for six years. He impressed on me the need to do as many family-friendly musicals because it was his deep belief that the theatre should be an experience shared by the whole family. He believed, as I do, that it is paramount that we start developing the theatre audience for tomorrow now. There is nothing quite like the energy of young people excited by what they see live onstage.

It is our sincerest hope that this production will be something that will be remembered by families that see this show for years to come. I surrounded the production with those who really love this musical. I believe that love comes through in the execution. Thank you to Darrell Huling for being the best collaborator a director could ask for, to Mallory Quinn (a former student of mine) for bringing her amazing staff and supporters (especially Olivia & Tami Carr) to the production and to Michael D’Aquino for hunting me down to design the show.

I am now in my fourth year as the Theatre Teacher at River Ridge High School, so I am watching my first freshmen class getting ready to graduate. This has been a very special group of students who have had my back from the moment we all walked through the Black Box Theatre, which is our classroom, for the first time. Thank you so much to Chelsea, Chaasad, Robert, Shawna, Jacob, Jadyn, Sophia, as well as those seniors who came in at some point into the department who sacrificed going to Grad Bash to be a part of this production. I will miss you all more than you will know.